The City of Moncton is selling 4.6 acres of land to the Metepenagiag Economic Ventures Corporation for $224,000.
General Manager of Legal and Legislative Services for the City of Moncton Nick Robichaud explains the deal.
“Essentially one of the parcels would provide them access to Harrisville Boulevard for their development,” says Robichaud. “And the other parcel is a small strip of land which is an unconstructed city road which bisects two of the parcels which they already owned.”
Robichaud says the Corporation is looking to turn that into Federally owned Reserve land which means it’s not subject to municipal property tax or bylaws and as a result they signed a Service Agreement with the City of Moncton.
“Because they will be looking for certain municipal services such as fire protection, police protection, animal control this Service Agreement provides for the municipality to provide those services in exchange for a fee,” says Robichaud. “So it’s essentially an alternate arrangement to any other commercial development which would pay property taxes.”
Robichaud says it’s not exactly what the city would normally be getting because “once the land is converted to Reserve land, it’s not subject to assessment by Service New Brunswick so we’re basing the payment on the appraised value of the land which once it’s developed will probably be close to the assessed value but it’s not exact.”
The formula for producing that number is the municipal non-residential tax rate multipled by the appraised value of the land.
Included within that Service Agreement are provisions stating the Corporation will also abide by City of Moncton bylaws.
